Electronic apparatuses including a disk player, a tape recorder, and a video camera have been decreased to a portable small size.
Such portable electronic apparatuses are minimized in its overall dimensions by reducing the size of its components and electronic device as well as the space where the components are installed. For decreasing the size of an electronic apparatus, an electronic circuit board on which the electronic components are mounted in circuitry arrangements is divided into smaller segments and the space available in the apparatus is filled with the smaller segments.
For example, a disk record and playback apparatus is proposed employing as a recording medium a disk cartridge which has a disk installed therein for recording data signals. In particular, the apparatus comprises a housing which is substantially identical in the size of a plan view to the disk cartridge and a disk record and/or playback assembly accommodated in the housing for recording and/or playing back a data signal on the disk of the disk cartridge.
Although the electronic apparatus such as a disk record and/or playback apparatus has been minimized in size for ease of mobility or portability, it is difficult to maintain the mechanical strength of particular components when dimensions are decreased to a minimum. Thus, the mechanical strength of electronic apparatus composed of such components is not ensured. Accordingly, it may easily be injured when accidentally dropped.
It is thus designed for protection of a mechanism where the mechanical strength is insufficient to have a housing in which the mechanism and electronic circuit boards are installed made of a material having a proper degree of mechanical strength so that the mechanical strength of the overall construction can be maintained to a level of insurance. The housing made of a material having a higher mechanical strength however results in an increase in the overall weight of the apparatus. The mechanism developed for increasing the mechanical strength will be adverse to decreasing the overall size of the apparatus.
In case that the electronic apparatus includes a set of small sized electronic circuit boards, each composed of a plurality of electronic circuits, for effective use of a limited space in the apparatus, electrical insulation and connection to the ground of its electronic circuits will be extremely troublesome.
If the electrical insulation and ground connection of the electronic circuits are not reliable, its housing, which may be made of a synthetic resin material for example, may be assaulted by static electricity, thus producing a fault and impairing operation of the electronic circuits.
It is possible for protection of the electronic circuits on the circuit boards to have the circuit boards integrated to a single unit. Although such an integrated form of the circuit boards ensures ease of the electrical insulation and connection to the ground of the electronic circuits. its increased size will prevent the apparatus from being minimized in its dimensions.